


traumaversary

by WeWalkADifferentPath



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Family Feels, Flashbacks, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Nightmares, Number Five | The Boy Has Issues, Number Five | The Boy Needs A Hug, Pillow & Blanket Forts, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Serious Issues, author uses characters to write about her own issues, in ch 2, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-06 23:07:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18226634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WeWalkADifferentPath/pseuds/WeWalkADifferentPath
Summary: It follows him like an unscratched itch. Under his skin, over his body, around hisenergy,like a mosquito that won’t leave him thefuckalone.April 1st.  April 1st. April 1st.(A character study of Five, with some inevitable family feels, in honour of March 24th).





	1. anything but gently

**Author's Note:**

> in the show , Five pops in on March 24th, and it's 8 days until the apocalypse, which is where I got April 1st from. we're all still pretending that the end of the world was averted somehow without vanya destroying the house or them time travelling, right?
> 
> also, sidenote: I'm also publishing this today because it's a traumaversary for me, too. My first, just like Five. that's why this is in two chapters (bc self-care) and if some of it doesn't make sense or has typos, my foggy brain apologizes. I'm channeling my own experiences into this as someone with CPTSD but if it doesn't resonate with you, that's okay! 
> 
> Comments and kudos and validation would be lovely today as a distraction, but please no constructive criticism on this one. Thanks y'all <3

The first thing Five hears when he wakes up is the sound of his own name. 

It’s likely that that’s what wakes him up, in fact; the room is free from any other disturbances-- lights off, curtains drawn, and yes, Five checks, windows still locked-- and he’s quite attuned to the sound of his name, more so than the average person. Old habits die hard, right? 

He stretches his feet out, warming up his body in the slow, easy way that he typically relishes, as he listens idly for any other mentions of himself. 

“-- only one example,” Luther’s saying. It sounds like it’s coming from the kitchen downstairs. No wonder he heard it, then; Luther’s voice carries. “What if it was just a bad day?” 

There’s a muffled reply, and then Luther says, “he’d tell us, wouldn’t he?” 

The pointed silence on the other end feels oddly satisfying. 

Five rolls his neck. This body is pretty flexible and it bounces back quickly, but lately he’s been stiff. It’s nothing he can’t handle, of course, but he needs to be mindful. 

He’d fallen asleep in his clothes, so once he’s done stretching he swings out of bed and pads out onto the stairs. Coffee is the first priority. Though he can’t say he’s mad about interrupting whatever secretive conversation Luther is having with someone. 

Although, he supposes. It could be important, couldn’t it? Maybe he’s taking this too lightly. He pauses for a moment, foot hovering over the next stair and breath held. He needs to listen to more. 

After a moment, he catches the stream of noise again. “-- an eye on him, yeah?” Allison’s saying. She sounds exasperated. She is talking to Luther, though, so perhaps that’s appropriate. “I’m worried.” 

That is… more troubling. It must be about her personal life, then. If it was about the family, or about something important, she’d have told him. She would have known that he needs to know, as quickly as possible, in order to--

“It’s Five, Ally,” Luther says. “He’s fine.”

What? Him? 

He pads the rest of the way down the stairs and rounds into the kitchen, controlling his velocity just so so that it appears that he’s casually strolling in as Allison says, “he just seems agitate-- oh. Good morning Five.” 

“Who’s agitated?” 

Allison swallows. She’s dressed, in trousers and a purple blouse, but she looks half-finished, feet bare and hair tumbling around her shoulders. It’s a familiar sight for him now. Allison is an early riser too. 

Selfishly, it’s his favourite look of hers. Like when they were children, and she would dress up in borrowed or stolen clothes a size too big and show off for all of them, proud and beaming and beautiful. 

Except this morning she’s not proud or beaming. She rubs at her eye and glances at Luther warily. He shrugs. 

“Uhm, we were just-- I was talking about you.” 

Allison’s voice has shifted into Concerned Parent mode. Five grits his teeth.

He’ll give her the benefit of the doubt, but he does not like where this is going. 

He pushes past where Luther is lingering against the counter to pour himself a coffee, sipping it as soon as his cup is full even though it scalds a little. 

“What about me?” he asks as he sits. He’s not an idiot. He can piece together the conversation they were having. They think that he’s been agitated. She’s worried about him. But he still has to ask, has to hear what she has to say. 

She glances down at her cup. Seems to think better of it, and meets Five’s eye. “You haven’t noticed how tense you’ve been lately?” 

“I’m not tense.” It slips out automatically. He isn’t, though. Not any more than usual. 

Well, okay, he has had that muscle stiffness. And there have been a few extra nightmares lately, and possibly a small increase in flashbacks. But he’s almost certain that she doesn’t know about those. So. 

Her brow creases as she stares at him. “Five,” she says slowly, “you haven’t slept properly in over a week. The other day Diego tripped over you from where you were crouched on the _floor,_ writing equations on the wall. And yesterday you threw an apple at Luther and almost broke his nose.” 

Five glances up to Luther for the first time. Luther shrugs, red in the face. “I’m fine,” he protests weakly. Although now that Five sees him, his nose is kind of red. 

But Luther had been acting like an idiot. He hadn’t been listening to anyone during lunch, domineering with his opinions, and he’d spoken over Vanya several times even after Five had tried to warn him, so-- 

“He deserved it,” Five says. He finishes off his coffee in one long sip. 

“Hey,” Luther croaks at the same time Allison chides, “Five.”

“He did. I don’t know what you’re on about. I’m fine.” 

“We’re just concerned for you, that’s all.”

“We?” Five asks. He shoots another look at Luther, who still looks constipated. When Allison follows his gaze he reaches in quickly, snatching her coffee cup from her. (Payback for her parental tone, he figures). 

But when she doesn’t even flinch to find her coffee stolen, Five sighs. Maybe he should be more responsive to this. She’s just trying to be helpful, after all. It’s coming from a kind place. 

So he meets her eye and nods. “It’s taken under advisement.” Then he grabs a chocolate croissant from the plate in the center of the table and takes a messy bite out of it, projecting himself back into his bedroom. 

He lands at his desk without spilling a sip of Allison’s coffee. 

 

–--

 

The next morning when he arrives in the kitchen for breakfast, it’s empty. 

He breathes a sigh of relief. It’s nice to hear the coffee maker percolating. The gentle sound of the water dripping into the pot acts as a pleasant backdrop to otherwise silent kitchen as he obligingly opens the curtains and peers out into the morning. It’s dim, as it has been for the last number of months; he makes a point to be awake before the sun is up. They’d just had the time change recently, so it’s even darker than he’s used to, but that won’t last much longer. 

Still, it’s peaceful, this empty dimness. It’s familiar. 

The sound of feet wandering in through the living room sparks his memory; Vanya has an early teaching gig this morning. That’s alright, though. She’s unobtrusive in the mornings. 

He rolls out a kink in his neck as he pours himself his first cup of coffee, breathing deeply as he waits for her to enter the kitchen. 

“Good morning,” he offers, as she breezes by him, a flurry of movement, grabbing her keys off of her hook. She smiles at him. 

“Happy first day of spring!” she chirps, and pulls on her rain boots. 

Five’s stomach clenches. He tightens his grip on his coffee mug. 

“Yeah, you too,” he murmurs.

It doesn’t feel right somehow. She doesn’t seem to notice, though, smiling again as she heads out into the rainy morning. But Five still feels suspiciously unsettled as he sits, the careful placement of his cup on the table the only noise in the once-again quiet kitchen. 

It’s not spring already, is it?

 

\---

 

The next afternoon, he catches a glimpse of the daily newspaper when he goes to grab a bowl for lunch.

He almost drops the bowl.

When he teleports himself back to his bed, his hands are empty, and he has to squeeze them into fists to stop them from shaking. 

 

\--- 

 

The worst day of Five’s long life was not, in fact, the day that he discovered the apocalypse. 

Nor was it the day that he found out about Ben’s death, huddled over Vanya’s book in the ruins of what once was a library, shuddering and sweating at once, while Delores murmured sweet comforts in his ear to soothe him. That day he had ripped the book to shreds the second he’d finished it, and never returned there. 

The worst day of Five’s life was not a day at all, in fact; it was moment, on a day that he doesn’t remember anymore, in a month that he couldn’t name. In a time that doesn’t actually exist.

It was many years after he’d teleported into the hellscape of the post-apocalyptic earth-- maybe even decades after. By then he’d stopped etching the days into his wagon; by then he’d stopped caring. The only date that mattered, anyways, was April 1st. April 1st, 2019. The day that he had to destroy. 

He and Delores were tired. He doesn’t remember why, but he does remember the bone-deep exhaustion, and how it had filled him up and emptied him out until he could barely move. It’s maybe the most tired he’s ever been. His body was lead and water all at once, fluid and heavy, stiff and boneless. 

But he was happy. 

Because he’d discovered a shelter for them to live in. It was small, but warm, and had enough of it’s ceiling that the ash didn’t get through, so they could finally be clean for a while. And best of all was the Bordeaux; a little shelf, a few expensive bottles, lined up neatly against the wall like the original owner had intended them for display rather than consumption.

Too bad whoever that was was dead, though, and Five was going to drink it. 

Delores was thrilled. 

“I think we deserve it, huh?” he’d asked her, smiling wearily. She returned the smile, eyes kind, and it lit something inside of Five every time she looked at him like that, to see her trust in him, her warmth for him. He was perhaps the unluckiest man in the universe, but she had a way about her that sometimes made him feel the opposite. 

He waved her off as she reminded him to drink water but grouchily obliged, taking a sip from his canteen as he placed her against the wall, smoothing down her shirt. A floral purple blouse that they’d picked out together last time they’d found a town. “Yeah, it’s not a bad little place here, is it?” 

He rarely stayed in one place for longer than a week or two, but it might be strategic to make this a longer dwelling. 

_A home,_ his mind whispered. A place to stay. A place to be together. Safe. For just a while. They were both tired, weren’t they? They both did deserve it, didn’t they?

“Yeah, me too, Delores. Me too.” 

They’d settled in as the world continued turning beyond their door. Five had washed in the few centimeters of water he found in their bathtub, where the ceiling was open, and imagined the rain that must have put it there, the refreshing water, it’s cool touch leading to growth, to life, back when life had existed. 

He’d wrapped up in his best sweater, feeling clean and resolving to wash Delores too, after they’d had their drink. He made them a feast, of canned beans and canned corn and a box of crackers he’d found in this family’s pantry, miraculously intact. 

It was the best he’d felt since he arrived in that time. 

But then it had all gone to shit. 

 

\---

 

“His trauma-versary is coming up,” Klaus says, that evening over dinner. He shoots Five an apologetic glance. Five bristles. He doesn’t need anyone else to explain his behaviour for him-- so what if he broke the chair handle? They’re old chairs, it probably wasn’t even his grip that did it. It could have happened to anyone. It could’ve happened any day. 

“My what,” Five deadpans. Vanya’s staring at him with no small measure of concern. He wants to break the other handle. 

“Your traumaversary,” Klaus repeats. “It’s March 19th today, right? We all know what April 1st was. It’s been almost a year.”

Heat rushes to Five’s face. The whole family is staring at him now, with soft concern, with surprise, with dawning realization. He hates it. He hates it. 

Besides, he’s _fine._ He is. 

Isn’t he?

 

\---

 

It only gets worse from there. 

On Wednesday, Vanya finds him under his desk, muttering to himself about heat and bodies and loud noises, too loud, too close, he can’t escape, and not again, he can’t do this again. As soon as she snaps him back to reality-- this reality-- he teleports away, finding himself an hour later hidden in the library behind a stack of books, his pillow clutched over his face. 

Thursday, he freezes with one foot hovering over the front entrance as he’s suddenly hit with the gut-wrenching, blood stopping realization that the apocalypse is coming. 

He shakes his head a moment later, chiding himself for forgetting the year that separates him from that particular task, and heads out the door. 

That night he wakes on top of the refrigerator to the sound of his own screaming.

On Friday, Klaus provokes him and Five kicks him in the shin and maneuvers him to the ground, only stopping to pant when his foot is on Klaus’s throat. 

“That escalated quickly,” Klaus gurgles from the ground, and Five is inclined to agree. 

By Saturday, Five-- who has never gone all the way to crazy, not once in 45 years-- thinks that he might finally be losing his mind. 

 

\---

 

It follows him like an unscratched itch. Under his skin, over his body, around his _energy,_ like a mosquito that won’t leave him the _fuck_ alone. 

April 1st. April 1st. April 1st. No matter how many times he acknowledges them, thinks them, whispers them, screams them, the words follow him around. April 1st. An insatiable beast, his subconscious.

When he does give into the demand, that’s when the questions start forming. Childish, ridiculous, illogical questions. He’s had that number-- April 1, 2019-- etched into his brain for 45 years, had quite literally carried around a stack of newspapers taller than a phone book so that he could check, over and over and over again until one of them disintegrated, and then pull another one off the stack. That date is folded into the very fabric of his being, and yet-- 

What if he’d gotten it wrong? 

What if it was April 1st, 2020? 

What if it could be this year? 

What if it could be any year?

When will he ever know that it’s over?

He doesn’t let himself pause long enough to even contemplate the question, let alone answer it. Or ask any others that might be more difficult to fight off. 

The only way he can blot it all out is to keep moving. If he can ignore it, he can function. 

Minimally. 

 

\--- 

 

“Are you crying?” Klaus asks. His voice is high and lilting-- _teasing_ \-- as he ambles over to the couch, but when Five turns to glare at him, his expression is surprisingly earnest. Rimmed green eyes stare at him with a lucidity that Five has no right to be surprised by anymore. Klaus smiles, but it’s gentle. Like he’s talking to a child. 

It’s worse than teasing. Five doesn’t need pity, for fuck’s sake. Especially not from Klaus.

He tells his brother as much. 

Klaus just rolls his eyes and lights up a cigarette, but Five doesn’t miss the way his face falls with something akin to resignation. Five takes a breath in, clenching his fists in his lap. Shit, Klaus is so _goddamn_ sensitive. And that’s not Five’s fault to fix. It’s not. 

Although. What he’d said might not have been entirely fair. Klaus’s lucidity is a testament to his efforts to stay more or less sober over the past year, after all. His brother has been trying. Is trying.

Five just-- wants it away from _him._

“I don’t cry,” he says anyways. Because he doesn’t.

(Babies cry when they require their needs met. For them, it’s logical; emotional displays are a social function. Five had learned very quickly as a child that his tears had served no purpose, and in the apocalypse they would’ve contributed even less if he’d attempted them, so he hadn’t bothered). 

Also, if Five talks again, maybe Klaus will stop looking like he pissed all over his favourite skirt. 

It works. Klaus pulls a face. “Oh, yeah, me neither,” he agrees, feigning solemnity. Five snorts. He closes his notebook, resigning himself to having whatever conversation this is instead of finishing the equation he’d been working on. He probably needs a break, anyways. Time has gone hazy around the edges. 

“You cry all the time.”

“I do not,” Klaus gasps, eyebrows furrowed. His head turns slightly to the right.“Shut up I _don’t._ ” 

Five shrugs. Klaus can deny it as loudly and flamboyantly, or as darkly and cynically, as he wants, but his body doesn’t lie. For all that the world continually kicks Klaus when he’s down, Klaus has always stubbornly held onto the hope that the day would come when it wouldn’t. It’s illogical, but it is Klaus. 

“I don’t, seriously!”

There’s a spark of genuine hurt underneath his dramatics, and honestly, Five doesn’t have the strength to be annoyed anymore. 

He’s just... so tired. And old. What’s that expression? Scraped out with a spoon. That’s how Five feels. Like a pumpkin. Empty, or mostly empty, except for this stupid _pressure,_ rattling around in his veins.

(April 1st, his brain reminds him. He bites his cheek). 

“It’s not a bad thing,” he says. It comes out more sincerely than he’d intended. 

Klaus blinks. “Whatever.” 

His spindly fingers bring the cigarette back up for a long drag and he closes his eyes, arm extending past the edge of the couch to absently tap the ashes off before he rushes it back to his lips. They wobble to the ground, landing somewhere beyond Five’s eye line. 

He could probably calculate where exactly beyond his eye line, if he wanted to. How many feet away from him they are, based on the distance to the ground and the movement that dislodged them. He could probably determine exactly how many piles of ashes are scattered around this room, too; Klaus always smokes two back to back. He doesn’t smoke in the house often, probably twice per week or so. Over the past year, assuming the approximate weight and size dimensions of the ash in an average cigarette, that would mean that--

“Yoo-hoo, Five.” Klaus’s hand is wiggling in front of his face. Some of the ash lands on Five’s nose. 

“What?” he snaps. 

“Where’d you go there, bud?” 

Five pinches his nose. “Nowhere. I was doing math. Until you interrupted me.” 

Klaus puts on a parody of a guilty expression. “Sorry, sorry.” He waves his hand dismissively. “I just wanted to let you know that it would be okay if you wanted to. You know?”

Oh, for fuck’s sake. Maybe he’s not too tired to be annoyed. “Okay if I wanted to,” Five parrots, deadpan. When Klaus just looks at him, head lolling down to make eye contact, Five raises an eyebrow. “Okay if I wanted to _what,_ Klaus.” 

Klaus considers the ceiling for a moment, clasping his hands behind his head. When had he put out his cigarette? “Cry,” he says. He pauses, stiff, before looking back down at Five imploringly. 

“I told you, I don’t do that.” 

Klaus shrugs, exposing a section of his stomach. Five wants to tell him to knock off the casual act, but he figures Ben’s already got that covered. Or maybe it was Ben’s advice to pitch casual; Five is prepared to yell at him too. “Whatever bro,” Klaus says. “I just hope you know that it’s normal, yeah?”

“I’m aware of the statistics on human emotions, Klaus. I’ve read more books than you can even comprehend.” 

He’s being rude again, and he knows it, but he doesn’t care. The itch is getting stronger and rage is bubbling up, heavy and humid, in his throat. He doesn’t want to talk about this with Klaus. He doesn’t want to talk about this with anyone. Crying is illogical, all of this is illogical. He doesn’t need to sing kumbaya to his emotions, he’s need them to _go away._

He hadn’t realized that he's been clutching his fists again until Klaus is gently unfurling them. Five blinks. How hadn’t he seen that coming? Klaus’s hands were behind his head, and then-- fuck, he really needs a drink. 

“You’re bleeding,” Klaus points out. He nods to Five’s hands. “Just so we’re on the same page.” 

And Five’s ready to snap again, to tell him that he can take care of his own damn self, thank you very much, and he doesn’t need Klaus’s lectures or his warm hands or his gentle expressions or his anything. But then he looks down at the little red half moons he’s managed to carve into his own palms with his nails, and he deflates again. 

“Tell Ben I’m sorry,” he mutters, feel a wash of guilt rinse the anger from his stomach. “I know he hates it when I do that.” 

Klaus’s head whips up. “Ben’s not here,” he says, with a low titter. Five shakes his head. 

“I know he’s not, idiot, but he’s been walking by every few minutes to snoop, right? So tell him next time.” 

Klaus’s laugh is somewhat hysterical. “Christ on a cracker,” he says, “I don’t know how you do that, bro.” 

Five rolls his eyes. “I’m a trained assassin, dumb-ass. Besides--” he cuts himself off. Neither of them need anymore fuel for their protective, stupid sibling bonding missions. He won’t give them any. 

But the knowing glint in Klaus’s eye tells him it’s too late. “Whatever you say,” he says with a wink. And then Ben seems to enter the room, because Klaus looks up. “Five loves us.”

“I don’t,” Five pouts. God, he really, really needs another drink. But-- “Just Ben.”

He hears it before he sees it. It’s too late; the pillow thwacks into Five’s face and he gets a mouthful of it, sputtering. “I’m-- I’m gonna fucking kill you,” he threatens, low and dangerous, as the pillow bounces into his lap. “I’m gonna murder you, Klaus, I swear to God I will.” 

Klaus, the infuriating bastard, just puts his hand over his heart and turns consideringly to his right, _away_ from the murderer who just threatened to end him. “Awh, look at our little murder child, Ben!” He snuggles his arms against his chest like he’s cradling a child. Five images he could strangle him, if he replicated the position. “He’s gonna kill us with his-- owh, what the fuck--?” 

Five grins. “Gotchya.” 

Klaus looks dumbfounded. He gapes at Five, eyes wide. Then his expression morphs into one of absolute, pure, revolting delight. “I cannot believe you just participated in a pillow fight.” 

Five shrugs, cracking his shoulders as he settles back into the couch. “Pillow decimation, maybe.” 

And Klaus cackles, long and hard and high. He clutches his stomach as he giggles it all out and then finally sniffs, wiping a tear from his eye. 

Five can’t help but think that all of this was worth it, for that. 

“Alright, this has been fucking swell little brother. I’m gonna quit while I’m ahead, and frankly, alive.” Klaus stands up to with an audible pop, groaning slightly as he tugs his arms over his head and angles up onto his toes like some kind of ridiculous cat, taking up as much horizontal space as physically possible as he reaches toward the ceiling. “I’ll catch you later, yeah?” 

Then he pauses, squinting at Five with a measure of consideration. It’s alarming how quickly his expression falls back into earnestness, into a quiet seriousness that makes Five squirm. His bare heels fall back onto the earth with a soft _thud._

“Seriously, though,” Klaus adds. “If you do ever want to talk about what you’re feeling… I’m a vet, remember? And daddy’s favourite little experiment, not that that counts much to you, I know. But still. I served, and now I’m sober, and there is a reason that I’m up in the middle of the night with you.” His stare is intense, imploring. Five’s sweating. “Just… remember that. Oh, and Ben says that he forgives you-- if you patch those up. Properly. With little car band-aids and everything.” That last part is probably his addition, judging by the innocent way that he flutters his eyelashes at where Ben must be standing. 

Five ducks his head. The little half-moons have stopped bleeding-- the cuts weren’t deep to begin with-- but they seem to stare back at him, glistening and taunting. What an irrational thing that was to do, Five ponders. Injuring himself helps no one. It serves no function. No purpose. 

Though-- it did make Klaus take notice, didn’t it? And it compelled Ben to check after his safety. 

Shit. Five has fallen into the most childish, most humiliating trap of social dynamics. Was he trying to get attention? What is he becoming? _Why can’t he be better than this?_

There’s a speck of ash on the carpet behind his hands, and Five squeezes the cuts tightly to avoid shuddering. He can’t be in this house anymore. He can’t be anywhere, anymore. He wasn’t lying when he told the Handler that, a year ago. 

A whole year ago. That whole thing was a year ago. Almost 365 complete days have gone by since he’s gotten back. 

And Five still doesn’t know how to be a person again. 

But maybe Klaus does. Maybe Ben does, too, in his way. Hasn’t he been doing the same thing, since they all started believing Klaus that he was there? Learning how to be real again? 

Five tugs the blanket over. It’s too cold in here. It’s too cold, and too warm, and he’s-- he-- 

“Hey, Five.” Someone quietly snaps their fingers. “Five, hey, you’re alright, yeah?” 

Five bites the inside of his cheek. Makes himself look up. The world is surprisingly blurry, somehow. He sees Klaus through fog. “Hm?”

Foggy Klaus stares at him, and then nods slowly, eyes brightening in recognition. “He’s crying,” he hears Klaus whispers conspiratorially, but Five can’t think who he might be talking about. He’s tired, so tired. He just needs to rest. He’ll be better after that. 

Maybe he says it aloud, because suddenly there’s another blanket headed toward him, the soft afghan from Klaus’s bedroom (when did he leave to get that?), and it’s guided gently over his shoulders by knobbly, familiar hands. 

And then there’s different hands-- ones he recognizes too, from somewhere, ones that make him feel, all at once, a quieting of the agitation in his veins-- and they’re brushing the hair back from his forehead. Softly, so softly. Five exhales. 

And then he sleeps. 

 

–


	2. hold me tell me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so oops, apparently there will be 3 chapters. I'm not totally thrilled with how this turned out but hey, I'm writing it for me first, right?
> 
> trigger warnings for ptsd symptoms, and just pain generally lol. this one's kinda sad... but that's what family is for, right?

The first thing that Five hears when he wakes up is the sound of his own name. 

“-- directly in there?” Diego’s saying. “Are you gonna wake him up?” 

“I wanted to give him a choice,” Klaus says. “Maybe he won’t appreciate my little gesture as much as I think he will.” 

There’s a pause, and then Vanya says, “he will.”

This time, Five knows immediately that they’re talking about him. And this time, when the rage comes bubbling up again, filling his chest with an aching, urgent sort of pain, he lets it. He lets it, because it’s easier than the alternative. 

He’s not an idiot. He sees the way that they’ve all been looking at him this week. The last time they’d looked at him like that, he had just fallen out of the sky and then jumped through Luther to reach the marshmallows. 

He’s become a stranger to them again. Something to be wary of. A threat, maybe, or at the very least, unpredictable. 

And Five doesn’t know what to do with that, so he lets himself be angry.

(April 1st. April 1st April 1st April 1st). 

There’s a soft knock on his door. It doesn’t immediately open afterward, so it must be Vanya.

“Come in,” he tells her. 

She pads in quietly, cautiously, looking at him fearfully and fuck it, he can’t be here. But before he can jump away, she puts a hand out. “Just come out into the living room, will you?” 

So he jumps into the living room instead. 

Right into the middle of-- of something. 

Five squints to adjust to the suddenly dim surroundings. He’s in a structure of some sort, that much is clear. It’s lit from within with a few small lamps spread strategically over the space, casting orangey-yellow glows that reach to all five corners. Various dishes and bowls, some empty, some with food, dot the structure at random, cutlery laid out next to them. The ceiling is too low-- but then it’s not really a ceiling at all, is it? It’s a sheet; all at once, Five recognizes what this. 

It’s not like he’s never been in a blanket fort before. 

“What the hell?” he whispers, and tries a jump again, even though it makes him ache, and this time he lands outside of the fort, looking in. 

The tent-like structure is enormous. It takes up almost the entire center of the living room from the bar to the far couch. There are pillows scattered everywhere, and blankets taped to chairs, in such a variety of garish colours that it’s dizzying. 

The fort has clearly been designed intentionally to fit more than one person inside. 

Five can quickly see why. 

“Do you know how many people I’ve killed?” he asks the room. 

His siblings all watch him, twitchy and hesitant. He hates it. He hates it. 

There’s a tense moment where it seems like none of them will speak, and Luther and Diego share some sort of look. “Yeah, yeah,” Diego says, “and we’re very grateful and respectful and all of that, okay? Now do you want in the blanket fort or not, old man.” 

Five crosses his arms. “You’re not supposed to be grateful,” he seethes. “You’re supposed to be _afraid_.”

_Don’t you understand?_ He wants to say. Don’t you see that I know how you all look at me?

Allison’s eyebrows rise to her hairline. “Of what?” she asks, bewildered. 

Five just barely catches himself on a stutter before the words come out. No, there’s no way he’s answering that. Not when Allison is already looking at him like he might break into pieces if she she doesn’t project her heart eyes directly into his veins. 

So he just huffs. Narrows his eyes. Maybe if he plays into the character, into this caricature of himself, it’ll put some distance between him and the way that they’re all looking at him. “I’m an assassin,” he emphasizes, “I don’t do blanket forts.”

That’s not strictly true. Five had lived in plenty of blanket forts, when they were the only option for shelter, and sometimes when they’re weren’t. But this isn’t that. 

Klaus raises a hand from inside the tent. “Ben says to shut your pie hole.”

“Oof, burn,” Diego says, far too smugly. Even Luther looks impressed. 

Five doesn’t know what to do with that. 

He looks at Vanya, trying to convey how lost he is, how the pressure is building up and up and how there’s no way that he can be here. She smiles at him. He pretends that he doesn’t see her dead body. 

“Happy traumaversary,” she says softly, kindly. 

And he knows that he’s lost. 

So he shoves the pressure down, forces his nerves back into his stomach. Clenches the anger into his fists and then releases it. Pulls his shoulders down, rounds out his spine, looks everyone in the eye, one at a time. He can handle their pity. He can handle this. 

(April 1st April 1st April 1st). 

But there’s something that he needs taken care of, if he’s going to do this. Revulsion almost sticks the words in his throat but he forces them out, one at a time. “All of the utensils and cups and plates need to be Styrofoam,” he says evenly. Then, “please.”

Everyone’s eyes widen ever so slightly, whether in confusion or in surprise that Five has actually agreed, but the Hargreeves family is nothing without their poker faces. After a minute Vanya nods, and goes to retrieve them from the kitchen, while Luther begins to stack the dishes they’d already laid out in a pile to take away.

“Be careful with those,” Five cautions, and he can tell by the way that everyone freezes for a second that his voice is strung as taught as he feels. Luther still seems confused, but he obliges, unstacking the last few dishes and starting back with one carefully balanced load instead. 

Still, Five is weary, stiff, with the edge of a jump buzzing through his finger tips just in case he needs it, as he watches Luther take them away. He won’t be caught off guard. He can’t. 

But something goes wrong. 

In the kitchen, Vanya fumbles to reach for the Styrofoam cups, and one of the ceramic glasses falls. Five sees it almost in slow motion; it slips from the cupboard, narrowly avoiding hitting her, and arcs toward the ground in a flash of cobalt blue. Five is moving before he’s even registered why.

Somewhere to his left, a glass eye shatters against the wall and rains shards. Five shatters with it.

 

\--- 

 

For all that Five had planned, for all that he’d prepared, he couldn’t have seen this coming. 

An earthquake. 

Such a cosmic joke; on par, in retrospect, to the end of the world taking place on April Fool’s day. The end of Five’s world takes place on a regular day, in a regular time, with Delores under a shelf of Bordeaux, drunk on both the first bottle and on their night of exhausted conversation. 

The Earth shifts, and the shelf falls, and Delores is covered in glass. 

Five had screamed, he’s pretty sure. Screamed though no one could help. Screamed though Delores didn’t actually need him to. 

Because after the earth had stopped shaking, Five had run to her with trembling hands, unconcerned about the glass getting stuck in his socked feet. He’d run to her and dropped to his knees, feeling nothing but the keening in his head to save her, fix her, oh god, she better be okay, she _has_ to be okay. 

And he’d cleared the debris and glass off of her with a sloppiness he didn’t think he was capable of, searching for the wounds under the biggest chunks of glass, because he needed to stop the bleeding, or else she’d die here, and he’d be alone, and there’d be more bodies, and god please no--

But then there was no blood. 

There was no wound. Because Delores was plastic, and couldn’t die, because she had never lived. 

And Five-- he would swear up and down for the rest of his life, to himself and to anyone that asked, that he’d always known that she wasn’t alive. Of course he’d known. She was a coping mechanism that he’d latched onto, a companion that he needed to avoid losing the entirety of his sanity. But she wasn’t a person, of course, he wasn’t stupid. 

But that day, with the ceiling around his ankles and the beginnings of ash floating in from the sky, Five realized for the first time that he was alone. 

And in the greatest of human paradoxes, Five sat back on his heels and cried, even though there was no one to come for him. 

 

\---

 

Five comes to a second later, when the glass doesn’t hit the ground. 

Reality enters slowly, but readjusting when the world is turned upside down is a benefit of frequent time traveling. He takes stock in a millisecond. His head between his knees, ass on the ground next to the blanket fort-- he hadn’t jumped, then. His siblings still with varying expressions of alarm, so it hasn’t been long. 

And the glass didn’t hit the ground, because-- because it’s floating in midair, caught in the translucent silver of a tentacle. 

Ben.

The tentacle is frozen holding the glass, as if it too has surprised itself, and seems to take a second to remember what it’s doing. It slithers past a stunned-looking Vanya to place the cup back onto the shelf, and then snakes above it to grab the cups she’d been going for in the first place, depositing them carefully next to her. 

“What the hell?” Luther says. 

Ben is in the center of the room, body positioned protectively between Five and the kitchen, looking almost as stunned as the rest of them as to what he’s doing there. 

“Ben?” 

“Is that really him?” 

“What the ever loving--”

They’re all talking at once, and the noise can’t exist peacefully alongside the echo of the glass that didn’t shatter. Five covers his ears with his hands and pulls in a breath. 

Klaus looks equally stunned, his hands glowing blue, but he’s smiling and silent, and when Ben looks back to him-- the monsters in his stomach snapping back like stretched elastic bands to disappear into him-- they beam at each other. 

“We did it,” Klaus says. “We’re getting good at this.” 

“Getting good--?” Vanya asks, and a memory hits Five like a freight train. 

Last night. Familiar hands. They’d pushed his hair back off his face and let him breathe, let him sleep. Hands that he hadn’t recognized, but knew all the same in his bones, in his veins, where it mattered. 

“You were there,” Five says, and Ben turns to him, and then Ben fades away. 

 

\---

 

An hour or so later, the questions finally stop. 

An hour or so later, Five has counted 83 piles of ash in the room, 104 tiles in this section of the ceiling, and 14 different versions of Ben’s dead body appearing in the corner of the room, covered in rubble and surrounded by smoke. 

(Sometimes imagination is just as insistent as memory). 

An hour or so later, a hand lands on his shoulder, and Five tries not to flinch. 

“Are you okay?” Diego asks quietly. Five shrugs. “I’m sorry if we all ambushed you. This is for you, don’t get me wrong, but it’s also for us, you know? March 24th. When you came back that day… a lot has changed since then. We all need to process. Right?”

It makes sense, and Diego’s being kind, so Five nods. Diego squeezes his shoulder. “We’re heading into the fort now, if you’re ready. Luther’s gotten rid of all the glasses. Nothing to break, yeah?” 

“Thanks.”

Diego squints at him. Tilts his head. “Anything else we can do? Any other...” he searches for the word, or maybe gets stuck on it. “Any other triggers?” 

April 1st. April 1st April 1st April 1st.

“No.”

“Okay,” Diego doesn’t sound like he believes him. “Okay, see you in there, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmk what y'all think. last chapter should be up soon.


	3. down the stream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Klaus brings a calendar into the blanket fort. Five gets some perspective on mourning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for any typos or mistakes. today is a day.

There’s a calendar in the middle of the fort that Five hadn’t noticed before. It’s sitting in the corner, half under a blanket, inconspicuous and ordinary. A regular white calendar, though it is quite large, longer than Five’s current arm-span, with the kind of glossy paper that’s difficult to rip. 

Five sees it but he ignores it. The cacophony of his siblings around him takes all of his attention to keep up with, as they flutter and talk and pass food around and slap each other on the arm or upside the head, _Diego, not in front of the kid, you should know better._ When Five reminds Allison that he’s not a kid, she slaps him too, albeit lighter and on the foot. 

It’s all a lot. 

“Okay, spaceboy,” Diego’s teasing, speaking through laughter. “Sure. Moon powers. Those definitely exist.” 

“I have a gorilla body,” Luther counters. “Moon powers are more plausible than that.” 

“Not by much.” 

“You’re just jealous,” Luther fires back, but it’s so much lighter, so much more a part of a fond inside joke, than it would have been a year ago. Allison shakes her head. 

“So where are these powers?” she asks, and Luther blushes. 

“Well, there was that time that I-- uh--”

“Do tell?” Klaus prompts with a wiggle of his fingers, and it’s odd that he’s the one encouraging, that he’s not telling the stories or stirring the pot. It might be for Five’s sake, for the way that Klaus keeps shooting him Significant Looks. It’s rattling him. 

The chatter and teasing fades to background noise and Five misses Luther’s response, if there is one. He just needs to sit. He just needs to rest. 

His head is pounding. 

They had all seen him, earlier. All five-- all six-- of his siblings had seen Five, ass to the carpet, cowering like an asshole, as the cup _didn’t even fall._ He has been reluctantly adapting to the feeling of embarrassment, particularly after this past week, but this is different. This is specific. They had changed their dishes for this. Ben had _materialized_ for this. 

Five can’t hide it. It makes him itch. 

But his siblings haven't commented. They have offered Five kindness, in a way that Five doesn’t seem to be capable of replicating. 

(Maybe Allison is right. Maybe Five isn’t as old as his chronological age would suggest). 

“I have an idea,” Klaus says. He claps his hands together with just a little too much enthusiasm. 

As if driving the point home on how much everyone has changed over this past year, they all immediately stop what they’re doing to turn to him. Allison side-eyes Klaus as she takes another bite of popcorn and Vayna moves to sit cross-legged, shifting a Styrofoam cup carefully to the side. 

“What kind of idea?” Diego asks. 

Klaus pulls out the calendar. 

 

\--- 

 

 _An x on the days that hurt,_ Klaus says. The bigger the x, the bigger the hurt. A star for the days with build-up, the days that have so much hurt that they spill over, so that they’re actually more than one day, more than one week even. He doesn’t look at Five as he says this. 

We’ll each pick a colour. We’ll draw our x’s, and when those days come, someone will be there. One of us will be there. We’ll look out for each other. 

Everyone agrees. Five doesn’t, but no one asks him to, and he doesn't leave either. 

 

\--- 

 

“I’ll go first,” Klaus says. He stares consideringly at the calendar for a moment, hands moving over it fluidly, almost reverently. He spares a shy glance at all of them before ducking his head back down. 

He takes the cap off of the red marker-- red for blood and red for rage and red for passion-- and smooths the calendar to March. “The present date,” he offers in explanation, with a shrug that’s far too casual. “Might as well start with the obvious.” He draws, tongue poking out, a small x in the corner of today, March 24th, leaving plenty of room for seven other x's. Then he flips to April 1st and does the same. Notes _almost got blown up_ in the margins with an apologetic smile at Vanya, which she returns. 

It occurs to Five then that it's weird, really, all of them watching this. It feels too personal as Klaus flips the calendar to another month, marks a medium sized x, writes _Dave’s birthday_ next to it. Flips somewhere else in November, puts a big x, writes _Dad’s training._ Five’s stomach clenches. Klaus makes one more note on another month that Five doesn’t catch, a star with _grief_ written next to it, and everyone in the room looks away. 

It only gets worse as Klaus pauses to put down his marker and everyone exhales, but then he picks up another one, green for softeness and green for calm and green for clarity, and Five watches all of them realize it at once. 

Ben. 

Without a moment of hesitation Klaus flips to November again. He puts a big green X on November 17th, the day after Klaus has dad’s training down for himself, and notes it with a carefully scrawled _First Time Klaus Overdoses_ that Five has to squint to read. 

He almost wishes he hadn’t. 

Then comes another date in November, written in a large green X. After a moment a large red X joins it. Five frowns. 

“November 10th?” he asks, when Klaus doesn’t move to write an explanation. “What’s--” He realizes, too late, that he’s probably not supposed to ask. Klaus had said that they don’t have to write an explanation, after all. 

But Klaus doesn’t look offended when he looks up, just surprised. “It’s--”

“The day you went missing,” Vanya finishes. She seems shocked that Klaus remembers. 

Five is shocked that either of them remember. And then he sees Diego drop his head, and Luther is nodding, and Allison has tears in her eyes, and god, do they all know it? Five hadn’t even known it; until this very moment, November 10th was just another day to him. 

(April 1st April 1st April 1st).

He doesn't know what he's meant to say. 

But Vanya beats him to it anyway, holding out her hands for the calendar, with a quiet “are you done?” that has Klaus nodding in response. She takes it from him carefully and then bites her lip in the direction of Ben’s spot before regarding Klaus again. “Is Ben done? Any others he needs added?”

Klaus looks back at her like she hung the moon. “No,” he says, “just the obvious ones.” 

Vanya nods, takes the green marker, puts a small x on March 24th and another on April 1st. Then she takes her yellow marker, yellow for sunshine and yellow for warmth and yellow for the sun that swallows the earth, and uncaps it, eyes focused and breath shallow. 

She curls a large X next to April 1st. Pauses. Writes _well, you all know,_ in delicate cursive next to it. Smiles at the room in a way she’d never have been capable of doing last year. 

Five might throw up. 

April 1st April 1st April 1st. 

Vanya flips to October, places a small x next to _day you all got your tattoos,_ and Diego puts a hand on her back. 

Then she flips to a date they all know, December 14th. Ben’s death. There she puts a big x, shoots a grim look at Ben’s cushion. 

Klaus makes a choking noise. “I-- I need that one too,” he whispers, wide-eyed. His expression shutters, vacant and hazy like he’s high again and after a second he startles as though someone has touched his shoulder. He adds, to himself or to Ben, “sometimes I just forget, you know..”

“It’s okay,” Diego says across from him. Allison rests a hand on his arm. 

Vanya simply nods, adding an X next to Ben’s death in the bright red ink. 

Allison goes next. She puts a purple star next to a date in February. “The day I lost Claire,” she says aloud as she writes it in. She adds her own small x, to Ben’s death, to Five’s disappearance, to March 24th and April 1st. Then she adds a small x on a date in September, and although Five doesn’t recognize it, a flash of understanding crosses Luther’s face. 

Diego’s next. A star for the day Eudora died. He writes no explanation. A large grey X on November 10th, March 24th, April 1st (April 1st April 1st), and a star for Ben’s death. He doesn’t look at Ben. 

Then he adds a small x in August for _kicked out of the academy,_ and, seemingly on second thought, flips back to the day Eudora died and adds a second, small x, which he labels only _Klaus._

Klaus gives him a watery smile. 

Luther takes to the task with laser-like precision. He adds a medium X to each of the expected dates, losses and Apocalypses, with the addition of a small x next to _got drunk and hurt my family._ Allison squeezes his hand. He doesn’t add anything about discovering the sealed, unread notes from the moon. 

He does, however, add a medium x next to _day I left for moon,_ and-- the first and only out of all of them to even acknowledge it-- a star for _dad's death._

By now, a year in, no one says a word about it. 

Then it’s Five’s turn. 

Luther hands over the calendar with a reassuring smile, and Five takes it mechanically. There’s a rise of panic building and swelling in his chest, because he hasn’t actually taken this time to think about what he wants to mark. He doesn’t want to mark anything. He doesn’t want to be here. 

This is far too personal. It’s all been too personal, too intimate, and the exhaustion of that has already left Five heavy and dissociated and with smoke on the edge of his vision. Shattering glass is still ringing in his ears. 

Which gives him a place to start. 

He takes his black marker-- black for ash and black for death and black for peace-- and flips to--- to-- 

“I’m not doing this.”

Luther makes a startled noise. “What… why not, Five?” 

There are half-moons in Five’s palm again. Glass shatters, and shatters, and doesn’t have a day to land on. Doesn’t have a place to stop. 

“I don’t-- I can’t-- I won’t ---” 

“You’re missing a date, aren’t you?” Klaus interrupts. The lines of his body are solemn. His green eyes glint in the lamplight as he reaches for Five’s ankle, gently, gently. “For something big. You don’t remember it, or never knew it.”

Delores is covered in glass. Delores is gone. Delores was never there. 

April 1st April 1st April 1st. 

He doesn’t have a tombstone for her, doesn’t have a death certificate. She never once left. She was never once there. 

“No,” he chokes out, hating it. Hating himself. “No. There’s no day.” 

Klaus nods in understanding. He taps a finger against his chin, a parody of a thinking pose. “Can you pick one?” 

Five blinks. Pick one? Just-- “pick a random day?” His voice is rising in volume. His siblings are watching him. 

“Yeah,” Klaus says. If anything he’s gotten quieter; maybe their volume has to match. Maybe anger and pain has to balance, or else it’ll tip over. “Any day that means anything, or means nothing at all. Just a day, to give it a place holder.” 

“But Delores--” isn’t here to pick it. It’s a stupid thought. Childish. Delores was never there. Glass keeps shattering. 

“She won’t mind,” Klaus says. Five wants to snap at him, to yell at him that what the hell does he know, anyways, about Delores, but he can’t make the words come out because they don’t make sense. 

“This whole thing is stupid,” he accuses instead. Anger is easier. Anger is safer. “None of these dates mean anything. They’re just dates.” 

To Five’s surprise, it’s Vanya who speaks up. “They aren’t,” she says. “Well, they are, in a way. But they aren’t, are they? They’re real because we make them real. Because they mean something to us.” 

“They mean nothing to me,” he says. She shakes her head. 

“I don’t believe you.”

“None of us do,” Diego adds. “But that’s the point, Five. It’s okay that they hurt. They hurt all of us.”

Six scrawled x’s on March 24th. Six on April 1st. Six siblings, six bodies, six days, six x’s. 

_They hurt all of us._

Maybe that’s true. 

And maybe Five is hurting them more right now. 

He pulls in a breath. 

April 1st April 1st April 1st. 

Pulls in another. 

Klaus’s hand is still on his ankle. 

Pulls in another. 

The marker in his hand fades back into focus. 

Before he can stop himself, he draws a star, quickly and without ceremony, on July 3rd. It doesn’t mean anything-- it’s not the date it happened or even the date that he found her-- but, in some dark and childish corner of Five’s mind that he’d never admit to aloud, he’s always thought of it as her birthday. 

_(“Pick any date,” he’d told her, squeezing her hand. “Pick any date and that’s when we’ll celebrate.” She’d looked dubious, but eventually she’d complied with a fond smile, and suggested early July. On the precipice of the hottest month, snuggled in between June and August. She’d said that the romance, the idea of such never-ending warmth, made her happy)._

Klaus squeezes his ankle as he finishes the star. Five flips methodically to today’s date, draws a large X, thinks better of it, and turns it into a star. Adds another star for April 1st. 

Such meaningless, heavy days. 

Before he can even think about any other dates, he scrolls a quick large X on the date that he’d discovered Ben’s death, because he knows that date, adds _Vanya's book: Ben_ as his note, and slams the calendar closed. 

He sets it down carefully, though, for fear of breaking it or getting it dirty. They’ve been treating it too reverently for him to wreck it now. 

“That’s great, Five,” Allison says. 

“Yeah,” Luther agrees. “We’re all proud of you, bro.” 

Five says nothing. 

 

\---

 

“I know it’s hard,” Klaus says later, face half in shadow, voice a little breathless, “but I hope that it helps just a little bit, having us around.”

 _It doesn’t,_ Five instinctively wants to say. It doesn’t, because I still have to see your dead bodies, over and over and over again. I still have to see them, and they won’t ever go away, and what is your presence in the face of that? Five is the only one who has to see them dead. Five is the only one who will have that seared into his imagination, his memory, for the rest of his life. So how can any of this matter? 

But he can’t say that. And it’s not entirely what he means, anyways (there were six x's next to April 1st, he reminds himself). So he says, “it does.” 

Klaus gives him a look, like he knows. “You don’t have to lie.” It’s not accusatory, or put-upon, it’s a simple, gentle statement. 

The weight of Five’s need to tell the truth suddenly feels like it might suffocate him. 

But to say the words might make them real. And that’s more terrifying than the clawing, absolute loneliness of silence. Or at least it has been, all of his life, but maybe that’s changing. 

“I’ll never be the same,” he admits. It’s not quite the whole truth, but a part of it. In more ways than one-- he can never be 13 again, because he’s not, but he can also never be the person he would’ve been at 58. Or the person he would be now, without the bodies behind his eyes. 

Klaus smiles at him, and his eyes are sad. “Do you have to be?” he asks. 

And that--

Well. Five prides himself on seeing everything from every angle; a side-effect of being able to travel in four dimensions, and of being a genius, and of being hired to solve the kinds of problems he was hired to solve. He’s always seen everything, he’s had to. But something about the way that Klaus asks that-- easy and heavy at once, with the weight of someone who knows, who understands, behind it-- has Five realizing that he’s never quite considered that particular angle before. 

_Do you have to be?_

Five looks at his family. Allison is in the middle of laughing so hard she snorts, and Luther and Vanya are watching her, second-hand giggles lighting up their features. There’s a spot next to Klaus where Ben’s sitting, and every so often Vanya glances to it, as if to keep Ben in the joke. Diego’s next to him, fiddling with Klaus’s knitting needs and with a private, fond smile on his face, and he catches Five looking at him, makes eye contact, smiles wider. 

When he looks back to Klaus, Klaus winks. 

And Five thinks: if he doesn’t have to be the person that he was before, maybe he can be a different one. Maybe he can be this one. 

For the second time in 24 hours, and the third time in 55 years, Five cries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we did it! extra thanks to everyone for all of your lovely comments. this story and the response to it got me through a really rough few days. you're all the best. xx

**Author's Note:**

> chapter title is from the video: Stiles. I think I'm losing my mind; This is WAR. on youtube. I tried to link it but apparently it's not coming through so search that if you're interested! 
> 
> it's actually an original song, written for the stiles fanvid. _we've lost control, anything but gently down the stream..._


End file.
